Traditionally, a manufacturer will distribute a coupon associated with a product to various customers and/or distributors. Such coupons may be distributed using a newspaper or a mailer. A customer receives the coupon and decides to purchase the corresponding product. Accordingly, the customer then goes to a merchant's store, retrieves the product, and brings both the product and the coupon to a cashier. The cashier checks the coupon against the product and, based on the coupon and the product matching, the customer can pay a reduced amount for the product.
At this point, the merchant is not responsible for receiving a reimbursement from the manufacturer for the discounted amount. The merchant must send the used coupons to a clearinghouse, which then sends a request to the manufacturer for payment. After processing and verification, the manufacturer will send payment to the merchant. This process can take many weeks, even months to complete, delaying payment to merchants. In addition, this process is prone to fraud as well as mistakes. Hence, there is a need for improved methods and systems in the art.